Political ‘genius’ 101 for Monyet King

The hypothesis is that being freed from housework allows men the leisure and luxury to be obsessive. A trait of geniuses is their obsession with the one thing. The focus by geniuses on that one activity or idea at the most obsessive level of intensity enables them to excel in their particular field, e.g. musical genius at cello.

I’m going to restate the truism that women have less time than men to indulge an obsession – say in devoting practice hours to obsessively kicking a ball around in order to become a soccer genius – because besides doing housework, women have to spend more time in the kitchen cooking.

I anticipate male readers to retort but men are better at cooking. More famous cooks are men, and professional chefs are men too.

That may be so but in your own families, did your mom or your dad do the cooking?

So the thing is this: When a woman is a good cook, she gets a compliment. When a man is a good cook, he gets paid a salary for his work.

Geniuses eschew social connections

“Geniuses typically work on their craft at the expense of social connections. A biography of Warren Buffet described how his wife would have people over, but instead of visiting he would spend his time in his room reading financial reports.”

Mrs Warren Buffet presumably supervised the cooking while billionaire hubby refused to socialise but remained closeted in his study.

Can you imagine if the roles were reversed and a woman did not come out to greet the guests? Can a hostess ignore the visitors, just like what the host Mr Buffet (but who gave the food a pass) did?

In fact, women are notable for presiding over ‘the preparation of dinner’ (in a broad sense). Look at the roles played by Laura Bush and Rosalind Rosalynn Carter or by Jackie Kennedy in a more glamorous style but still essentially that of a chatelaine.

I believe that Hillary Clinton is smarter than Bill but the positions of power both attained do not reflect their capabilities relative to each other.

The exceptions to the rule are Dennis Thatcher to Margaret, and Mr Whatever-His-Name to Julia Gillard.

Somehow I can’t imagine Rafidah Aziz doing any housework. You don’t have to tell me that she can afford any number of domestic help, that’s a given. It’s the principle of the matter — it’s just too difficult to picture her performing mundane household tasks.

Monyet King on women in politics

“Women are indeed doing very well in many sectors. Unfortunately, in the political sphere, they are seriously lagging. Not sure when and how this will change.

Let’s narrow it to Malaysian women in politics, shall we?

Presumably like the balance of power relationships between Laura and GW, between Rosalind Rosalynn and Jimmy, Margaret and Dennis, Julia and her partner (whom few people can remember what he looks like), a woman politician might fare better with a husband who can do the housework and cooking.

Therefore, to improve the career prospects of women in politics, we need to see two areas of change: One, Malaysian females becoming a whole lot more bossy and manipulative so that the talent pool is expanded, and two, more husbands prepared to do housework and cook.

What people think of politicians

The BBC report quotes findings of a new study into perceptions of honesty from the Centre for the Study of Integrity. Presenting the findings, Essex University’s Dr Sarah Birch said, “Governments become less effective if people think they’re all crooks.”

“She revealed that a survey conducted during the [UK] general election of 2010 found that 58% of those questioned thought the honesty and integrity of elected politicians in Britain was low or very low.”

According to the findings, only 7% of Brits would rate the honesty of their politicians highly. They are also “concerned about how politicians use their words” and want their politicians to avoid spin.

“in these days of managed appearance, perhaps to be a ‘genius’ at something may simply mean to have the smarts and the wherewithal to manage impressions”.

To Monyet King’s musing on the advancement of women in the political sphere; my own observation is that what he desires is now happening on the back of recent developments.

If anything, politics admirably demonstrates the process of natural selection and survival of the most ruthless and cunning.

The most aggressive factions in certain parties have now acquired the wherewithal, and thus allowing their woman politicians to successfully manage impressions.

They have the wherewithal to utilize the exposure and popularity instruments to create the desired impressions. However impression is not fact. People who are fooled by impressions that are counter to facts, in my humble opinion, are imbeciles.